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Abstraction is indeed a weakness in the 60 pages I read. My own view is that language cannot be separated from peoples or cultures. The Germanic peoples were a visible entity and for English readersD.H. Green's Language and history in the early Germanic world (1998: CUP) can be highly recommended. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Keith Briggs" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Monday, October 02, 2006 3:40 PM Subject: [EPNL] Ringe's "From Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Germanic" > It's most commendable of Keith to draw our attention to Don Ringe's book, > though having read the first 60 pages on the OUP site, I'm not sure of its > direct relevance for English onomasts. All the same, it would be most > useful if Keith, in his inimitable fashion, could provide those of us not > prepared to shell out 65 quid on trust with a synopsis of what Ringe has > to > say about Germanic. I would agree that it's not of direct relevance* for English onomasts. I mentioned it because of the discussion about Proto-Germanic that came up, and I thought anyone interested in language would want to know about this book. I have not read it all and in any case there's a huge amount of detail here which would be hard to summarize. Nevertheless, I think it's an important book as for the first time we have in one place (and in a reasonably accessible form for the non-professional) a detailed description of the IE to Proto-Germanic stage. A weakness is perhaps that no context is given - not a single time or place has been mentioned in the parts I have read so far. Linguistic evolution is presented as an abstract process. Also, there is no index apart from word-lists, so if you want to find out the definition of amphikinetic or proto-vrddhi, you're in trouble. A highlight for me was the convincing explanation of the English weak preterite (yes, it's from "did", but it only works if you get all the details right). Keith * though perhaps consider the recent duro- discussion - could its odd combining properties have anything to do with the underlyingly (a favourite word of Ringe) dual nature of the etymon (PIE *d^hur 'double door', Ringe p190, 197 etc.)? I.e. the borrowers had no dual and could not get the inflection right?